Brunei Sultan Issues Warning to Sharia Critics

Citizens in Muslim-majority Brunei who’ve expressed criticism of a plan to introduce harsh Islamic criminal laws, including stoning for Muslim adulterers, have received a stern warning from the ruling sultan – stop the insults.

Reuters

Brunei’s Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah salutes as the national anthem is played during celebrations for Brunei’s 30th National Day, in Bandar Seri Begawan, on Feb. 23.

In a national day speech posted online, Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah said “certain parties” had attempted to “question and oppose” the upcoming implementation of several Islamic laws known as Sharia.

Islam has long been the official religion of this tiny, tropical kingdom, which practices a more conservative version of the faith than its Muslim-majority neighbors, Malaysia and Indonesia. Brunei has one of the highest per-capita incomes in Southeast Asia, thanks to vast offshore oil reserves in the South China Sea, and the reigning sultan, who has ruled for nearly five decades, is also the prime minister and controls the defense and finance ministries.

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The roughly 400,000 citizens of this wealthy nation rarely challenge the monarch publicly. But recent posts on blogs and other social media have criticized the Islamic regulations set to come into force in April.

“I think that it will be better if the Bruneian government were to take problems regarding our country’s development as serious as the implementation of Sharia law,” reads one post published earlier this month.

By voicing opposition to the planned regulations, the sultan said such critics also appeared to have insulted the king and religious scholars.

“They cannot be allowed to continue the insults, but if there’s an element that can be used against them in the court, then the first phase of the [Sharia] law implementation this April will be very relevant to them,” he stressed. The statement did not elaborate.

The sultan has sweeping powers owing to an emergency rule declared in 1962 – to ward of the purported threat of communism – and which remains in place to this day.

Under Brunei’s constitution, he also has the power to order changes to written laws for the public interest, said Abdul Hamid Mohamad, former chief justice of Malaysia. The implementation of Sharia law can be considered “one of those orders,” he said.

The Sharia criminal laws unveiled in October and expected to come into force in April, would deepen the role of Islam in the country’s judiciary. At present, Sharia laws are currently limited to personal and family issues, such as marriage disputes.

The new laws have raised concerns among human rights groups, who say they are a step back for Brunei.

Capital punishment for rape, sodomy and extramarital sexual relations is “a particularly horrific form of torture and execution,” said Sam Zarifi, regional director for Asia and the Pacific at the International Commission of Jurists.

While the Sharia laws would only be applicable for Muslims, who make up about two-thirds of the population, it includes punishments such as amputation of hands for theft.

Noting that a series of thefts have occurred in the country’s mosques, the sultan’s statement warned perpetrators that the Sharia law “awaits them.”

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Indonesia Real Time provides analysis and insight into the region, which includes Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Brunei. Contact the editors at SEAsia@wsj.com.

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